I always had an infatuation with weddings. Something about them. Perhaps it was the white dress. Or the overflowing florals. The bridesmaids. Or the love between the couple. But something about them attracted my attention from the time I was very young.
Our family’s favorite vacation spot was a little known Methodist Retreat center in North Carolina, near a better known town called Maggie Valley. We tried to visit Lake Junaluska annually, rotating from vacation house to vacation house based on our previous interesting experiences. But the lake never failed us. Nor did the walks around them, the rolls down hills covered in fall foliage, or the hot chocolate and coffee dates had between the auditorium and gift shop. It was like home away from home.
I was a Spy
Lake Junaluska was where I really fell in love with weddings. I couldn’t have been more than six years old. But less than a quarter mile from the motel where our family was staying was the most gorgeous outdoor wedding. Looking back there was nothing significant about it at all. The attendance was small, the decor minimal, and I don’t even remember the bridesmaids. But it was a wedding, nonetheless.
And to my six year old mind, I couldn’t understand why we weren’t invited. When Mama insisted that we not intrude, or even watch from the sidelines, I was devastated. I tried not to gripe, but inwardly I pouted as I sat and ate my leftover chicken fingers from the previous evening’s dinner.
Looking back, that incident was silly. Surely I should have know that a stranger doesn’t attend a wedding of a stranger. But little did I know, that was the foundation for many more years of “spying” on Lake Junaluska weddings.
As we made our way down the line of rental houses the years following, I learned to use my pink Canon digital camera to “shoot” my first weddings.
Once there was a wedding at the chapel. When the bridal party lined up for photos following the ceremony, I held my tiny digital shooter as steady as I could manage and tried my hardest to capture the memories from the front porch of our rental house.
Nevermind that my device was zoomed in to the however zoomed in degree that was possible and captured beyond grainy footage. I felt like I was a part of the day. I could treasure other people’s memories in time capsules that I created.
To my knowledge I spied on four total weddings over several consecutive years. During the years when there were no weddings to be seen, I would listen carefully and try to detect jubilation coming from the hotel on the hill above. When once I did, I felt utterly left out to not have the privilege of witnessing even a glimpse of the white dress or gorgeous bride.
An Imposter
I once even contemplated pretending to be a guest at a wedding reception held in the gift shop’s spare room. I, along with my trusted companion, Hannah, visited the library in the neighboring room of the party to glimpse the bride in her white dress and am convinced she looked right at me. It was then that I knew she knew that I was an imposter. I scurried out of that situation fast. Somehow I still managed to see her and her brand new husband leave from their reception in their fantastic horse drawn carriage, though. What a time those vacations were. Half the fun was shooting weddings.
I never would have dreamed in all my life that I would now be photographing weddings as an adult. When I think back to my childhood, I see that I always loved weddings. And, yes, I always even loved shooting weddings, because they allowed me to freeze time and go back and relive other people’s wedding days. As crazy as it sounds, that’s exactly what I do now. I give others the chance to relive the most precious day of their lives over and over again, through the time capsule of wedding photography.
It is beyond a privilege to provide such a lasting service to couples who care about remembering, cherishing and holding onto those memories.
A day is only lived once. But photographs are lived for a lifetime.
Joyfully,
Lauren